The Lost Pleasure of Letter Writing

My handwriting was rather good during school days or so I was told then. I mean few teachers and friends used to either love me too much or I heard them wrong! Else why would they say such a thing, tell me. Well, my father still feels to this date that my handwriting is too unintelligible!! And echoing the same words of course is my son! But of course we’ve seen much worse than mine, no? Well, mine is better than many, you bet!

Yet for all the misgivings my readers might have conjured till now about my handwriting, here I sit, fountain pen in hand, attempting to resurrect the lost art of letter writing. Call it nostalgia. Call it rebellion. Call it what happens when you’ve sent one too many thumbs-up, clap and love emojis and realised you’ve forgotten how to express actual human emotion.

When did we stop writing letters? Not emails—those soulless, efficient little packets of information that get the job done, but have all the warmth of prepackaged food. I mean proper letters. The kind that arrive in envelopes, bear your actual handwriting (spidery or otherwise), and carry the implicit message: ‘I thought of you long enough to find paper, compose my thoughts, locate a stamp and figure out where the nearest postbox is hiding these days.’

I remember so well my school days. My father was stationed at the sites of thermal power stations and there being no good schools there, my mother and I used to be in the city, me in a rather good school. And both Ma and I would write our letters to Baba. I would pour out my heart, all nitty gritty and even possibly my dreams. And with such impatience we would wait for Baba’s letters to reach us. That anticipation, that moment of holding my pen to write and opening his letters and devouring over each word so many times over…it now seems like a humungous bag of such delicously mixed emotions. I had a pen friend too, she was Russian, we had met during a holiday and had exchanged letters quite a few times. Even more precious to me than the actual letter was the envelope, paper and of course the stamp that had arrived all the way from mysterious Russia! Few of us school friends would also exchange long letters during vacations.

It’s rather intimate, when you think about it. Someone held this paper. Their hand moved across it, leaving traces of their thoughts, their mood, perhaps a small coffee stain that speaks to their morning chaos. You can see where they paused, where they crossed something out, where they added a postscript because they remembered something important or delightfully trivial.

I discovered this pleasure by accident, during a recent trip back home (Kolkata), my mother showed me a box of letters she had written in her youth to my father. Also tucked away were letters from our friends, an aunt and then some more. Reading them was like discovering a time capsule, but more than that—it was witnessing the act of someone valuing connection enough to slow down and create something permanent.

These weren’t profound philosophical treatises. They were ordinary observations elevated by the simple act of being written down. They asked about well being, about friendships, about grieving and happiness, about missing someone. They narrated about their lives and their musings. And it all added to so much pleasure as if in today’s world an actual video call was happening. You could almost see the person’s face, his expressions, his laughter, his loneliness.

Compare this to our current communication. WhatsApp messages that disappear. Emails we delete. Text conversations that scroll into oblivion. We’re creating nothing. We’re shouting into the digital void. And the void, predictably, forgets us immediately. In fifty years, what will we leave behind? Screenshots? Backup files? The bleak poetry of our search histories? So this is what I have resolved to do this year. Write letters to those I love. Start with a few. About the ordinary, beautiful everything of daily life that doesn’t fit into a text message. The way the light falls across my desk in the late afternoon lazy hours. The book I’m reading that made me think of them. A question I’ve been pondering. Thoughts that meander and unfold without the pressure of immediate response. Meaningful connections are built in these quiet moments.

So this is what I have resolved to do this year. Write letters to those I love. Start with a few. About the ordinary, beautiful everything of daily life that doesn’t fit into a text message. The way the light falls across my desk in the late afternoon lazy hours. The book I’m reading that made me think of them. A question I’ve been pondering. Thoughts that meander and unfold without the pressure of immediate response.

I gather letter writing is also hopelessly inefficient, which is precisely its charm. If I need to tell someone something urgent, I’ll text them. But a letter isn’t about urgency. It’s about connection. It’s about saying, ‘I’m giving you my time and attention in a way that can’t be interrupted by notifications, can’t be dashed off during a commute, can’t be anything other than deliberate.’

And then there’s the waiting. The delicious anticipation of knowing your letter is making its way to someone. The surprise when you receive a response weeks later, long after you’d forgotten you’d written in the first place. It’s like finding money in a jacket pocket, only that it’s better because this is connection, rather than currency. This vintage letter writing experience is something I truly cherish.

I have a lovely old wooden box with curvatures on the lid, which I had purchased online, not exactly knowing why. I shall keep all the letters I receive in this box. Occasionally I shall reread them. They would be a record not just of friendships but of moments. Of who I was when I read them. Of seasons and moods and the slow unfolding of life. Try doing that with your WhatsApp archive. I dare you!

I’m not suggesting we abandon digital communication. I’m as addicted to the dopamine hit of instant messaging as anyone. But perhaps we could supplement it with something slower. Something that can’t be captured by a screenshot, forwarded or liked by strangers. Something that exists in physical space, created by hand, received by hand, saved if we choose.

Start small. Write one letter. To a friend, a family member, even to your future self. Don’t worry about your handwriting. Don’t aim for perfection. Just write. Tell them about your day, your thoughts, something that made you laugh. Make it ordinary. Make it real. Do not aim for perfection. Do not manufacture sentences. Just let your thoughts flow,

So I’ll be writing letters. Perhaps you’ll write back? No pressure for immediacy. Take your time. I’ll be here, pen in hand, waiting. The way people used to wait. With patience, anticipation and the gentle faith that good things come to those who don’t demand instant gratification. Let handwritten correspondence resurface with its lost magic.